The present invention relates to apparatus for transferring material between conveyors especially, but not solely, conveyors in mine workings.
In underground mine workings, it is known to discharge material from one end of a face conveyor onto a roadway conveyor. Usually, the conveyors extend at right angles to one another and the face conveyor is elevated at its end region so that the material falls onto the roadway conveyor. Often material becomes jammed at the transfer station and this is especially the case where the material contains large irregular pieces--such as with coal winning. To better guide the material at the transfer station, it is known to utilize an inclined chute or channel which guides the material through 90.degree. but accumulations and jamming can still occur. In order to preclude this problem, it is known to install a curved intermediate conveyor section between the face and roadway conveyors and to cause the scraper-chain assembly to take the material around the curved section via a roller or similar guide. Examples of curved intermediate conveyor sections are described in German patent specifications Nos. 2013089, 2163497, 2301348 and 2065424. Although jamming is reliably prevented by these measures, the curved sections are expensive to construct and the deflection of the scraper-chain assembly from the face conveyor to the roadway conveyor involves exceptionally high traction forces and consequently the chains and drive systems must be especially robust which again involves extra expense.
A general object of the present invention is to provide an improved transfer apparatus for facilitating the transfer of material between conveyors.